Ohio State’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion and Center for Belonging and Social Change will be discontinued effective Friday, and related professional staff positions will be removed, university President Ted Carter Jr. announced at Thursday’s University Senate meeting. University spokesperson Ben Johnson confirmed 16 employees will remain employed for 60 days, during which they will work with the university to find alternative positions. The Lantern is working to identify the affected individuals and their current roles. Additional staff positions beyond these 16 may be reassigned to other university offices. The Hale Black Cultural Center, Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity and other DEI-related units at the university are currently under the president’s review, though they remain open at the time of publication. According to a campus-wide email sent by Carter Thursday, certain services within ODI will continue, though the email states programming and services ...